


even the wind mourns

by Spencer_Grey



Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: Alex has a little sister, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Julie Loves Her Boys, fight me on this, they make me emo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:01:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26814040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spencer_Grey/pseuds/Spencer_Grey
Summary: The cemetery is practically empty. The afternoon sun casts everything in a low golden shadow as she wanders lot after lot, the quiet expanse seemingly stretching on forever.Julie reads each gravestone she passes, learning the faceless names of people gone by, wondering whether their ghosts are stuck on this side, trapped by some unfinished business.She sucks in a breath, smoothing the nonexistent wrinkles in her dress.She’s found it -- him.Luke Patterson. Friend. Son. 1978-1995.-or, Julie visits their graves.
Relationships: Alex & Julie Molina & Luke Patterson & Reggie, Flynn & Julie Molina, Julie Molina & Alex, Julie Molina & Luke Patterson, Julie Molina & Reggie
Comments: 93
Kudos: 744





	even the wind mourns

**Author's Note:**

> oh look at this, another 2am post. when will this hyperfixation end?

Julie doesn’t feel guilty about it. It’s not even lying, not really, more like she’s dancing around the truth whenever she sees the boys. It’s better to beg forgiveness than ask for permission, or something like that -- though, that’s more like something Flynn would say than Julie would. 

She shrugs any hesitation away. With an endless amount of information at her fingertips how could Julie  _ not  _ do it?

She starts with Luke. 

At first, Julie considers simply asking his parents but that feels like a gross misappropriation of their relationship, so she’s content with the hours of research and staying up into the late hours of the night to find what she’s after. 

It takes a few days of solid commitment to the task but she finds it. 

The boys think she’s going to Flynn’s house, and if anyone were to ask her, Julie was there all afternoon. It’s not a far walk, barely half an hour, and on her way she buys a small bouquet of flowers. Mostly dahlias, in honour of her mom who brought them together. 

The cemetery is practically empty. The afternoon sun casts everything in a low golden shadow as she wanders lot after lot, the quiet expanse seemingly stretching on forever. 

Julie reads each gravestone she passes, learning the faceless names of people gone by, wondering whether their ghosts are stuck on this side, trapped by some unfinished business. 

She sucks in a breath, smoothing the nonexistent wrinkles in her dress.

She’s found it -- him. 

Luke Patterson. Friend. Son. 1978-1995. 

Simple, not telling of the complexity of the person the headstone is meant to be commemorating. 

Despite knowing that Luke is dead, Julie realises she never  _ understood _ what it meant and it strikes her then, like a cold, hard slap against her cheek. He  _ died _ , young, painfully, without actually getting to love, so full of dreams and desires

Seeing his pristine grave, Julie feels a sickening wave of sorrow take her. She loves Luke, more than thought was possible after losing her mom, and there’s nothing she wouldn’t do to keep him in her life, but it’s  _ not fair _ . Not fair that he was so young, so ambitious, and everything was robbed from him like it meant nothing.

He lost his parents, his music was stolen from him, his legacy -- all of it taken from at only seventeen. 

Julie kneels, trembling hands placing the flowers against his headstone -- the word feels bitter and wrong. 

“Hey,” she says quietly, “I, uh, I hope you can’t actually hear me. But if you can, please don’t be mad. I just wanted to know that, even though you’re a ghost, someone cares enough to visit you.”

A single tear slowly slips down her cheek. It seems stupid to be mourning someone that, to her, isn’t gone. 

“When I go to see my mom, I just tell her everything that I normally would. She -- she knows all about you guys. Hope you don’t mind.”

Julie lets herself ramble, not having any semblance of a plan going into this but she doesn’t want to leave. Even as the sun starts to descend beyond the horizon and her legs start to go numb, Julie stays before Luke’s grave, going through all five stages of grief within the few hours of talking to herself.

A sharp gust of wind brushes by, carrying dead leaves over the patch of grass she rests on. She shivers, wishing she’d brought more than the light dress.

“Those are beautiful flowers.”

Julie flinches, jumping to her feet and spins around to face the sudden voice. “Oh, Mrs. Patterson.”

Luke’s mom stands before her, cardigan wrapped tightly around her. “Thank you, Julie,” she says softly.

“It’s no problem. I -- I didn’t mean to intrude, I’ll leave you two alone.”

“No, stay, please.” Emily steps forward, taking Julie’s side and sharing her warmth with the girl. “It’s nice to know there’s someone else that wants to visit him. His band were his only friends.”

“My mom was a fan,” Julie says without thinking, not knowing why she feels so tempted to spill her guts to the woman. “I think that’s why I feel so connected to them.”

Emily smiles, something sad and warm, and takes Julie’s hand into hers. “I just wish…” she starts, voice barely above a whisper, “that Luke could’ve known, could’ve seen his impact. If we hadn’t…”

Her voice breaks. Kind eyes turn red as tears begin to form, streaming freely down her face. Emily makes no move to wipe them away, only holding tighter onto Julie. 

Julie returns it with a reassuring squeeze. “Luke wouldn’t blame you,” she says, wishing with everything she has that she could tell Emily the truth, let the poor mom know how much her son loved her. “You shouldn’t blame yourself for anything that happened.”

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Emily says, though she doesn’t seem convinced. She clears her throat. “It’s getting dark. Would you like a ride home?”

“As long as it’s no trouble.”

“None at all. Come on, honey, let’s go.”

Julie casts one last glance to Luke’s grave, suddenly restless to get home and hold him like he’ll disappear without it.

\--

She finds Alex next. It’s a lot more difficult than Luke was but there’s nothing that can stop a Molina’s stubbornness.

He’s buried in a cemetery on the other side of the city, nestled between a tiny suburb she’s never been and some mountains. It takes hours on a bus to reach it, but she finds herself in the small field by midday, having taken the earliest trip.

Alex is in the far back, shaded by an old rotting tree that shields him from the brunt of the elements. But even that hasn’t been enough to protect his headstone from decay. Julie can only make out  _ Alexander  _ on the faded stone, a barely legible birth and death year underneath. No kind of message left for him. 

Julie sits cross legged before him, pulling from her bag the single dahlia she brought with her. It’s clear no one’s been for a while, a layer of dirt covering his name.

“I’m sorry,” is the first thing she says. A distant clap of thunder catches her attention -- a storm’s nearing and she doesn’t have much time. “I’m sorry no one visits you, I’m sorry your parents suck, I’m sorry that you died before things got better.” 

From the moment she knew Alex is gay, not that is was ever much of a secret, Julie did everything in her power to educate herself on every kind of event that’s improved the world between his death and their meeting -- desperately wanting to show how  _ better  _ things are. 

But again, she’s struck with how unfair this is. That he never got to experience that change, that revolution, he never had the opportunity to live through the movement. On his behalf, Julie is mad, is utterly  _ pissed off _ .

It will never fail to enrage her. The idea that her Alex, always understanding and kind and compassionate, died before anything could get better. It will never get easier, knowing how unfair that none of her boys got the ending they deserve.

“I mean, at least you can see it now,” she says as if that’s a fitting substitute for actually experiencing it. “It’ll have to do, I guess.”

The sudden crack of a twig behind her catches Julie’s attention and she casts a look over her shoulder to find a middle aged woman approaching, flashing her a tight smile. Julie returns it and her gaze back onto Alex. 

That is, until the woman sits down next to her, groaning slightly. “So,” she starts, “how do you know Alex? I’m pretty sure you weren’t even born when he died.”

For a moment, Julie wants to ignore her, mistaking her for being Alex’s mother but on a second look, she’s nowhere near old enough for that -- her face too soft to be some ancient homophobe

“I live in the house his band used as their studio,” Julie explains. “You?”

The woman lets out a breath. “I’m his sister.”

Julie whips her head around to face her, fully taking her in. And she sees it, the same blonde hair hanging loosely around her shoulders, the same sharp jawline, the same openness in her stormy grey eyes. Everything is so similar to Alex that Julie should’ve pieced it together the moment she laid eyes on her.

Alex hasn’t even alluded to the fact he had a sister.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Julie says because it feels like the right thing to say, because what else could she say to the sibling she never knew existed.

There’s a flash of something darker in the woman’s eyes, like the quick shove of anger breaking through before she can reign it back in. “Don’t be.” Her voice is low, eyes staring holes into the headstone. “I don’t remember him much.”

“Oh,” Julie mutters, absentmindedly picking at the grass. “How old were you when…”

“I was ten when he died,” she answers bluntly, a detachment in her tone that tells Julie there's some hidden wounds beneath the surface. 

Julie feels wrong pushing this poor woman but she needs answers, and so she asks, “Were you close?” though, she thinks she already knows the response. 

She shakes her head, laughing dryly. “I think we were, when I was younger but… towards the end, he wasn’t home much. And even when he was, things were -- well, they were bad with our parents.

Waiting expectantly, Julie stays silent, letting Alex’s sister talk -- as she clearly needs to do, to someone that’ll listen, that knows Alex. 

She looks at Julie with such raw emotion, such vulnerability that the sheer intimacy feels overwhelming. “Took me about ten years to find out why mom and dad never talk about Alex.” She hesitates, looking at Julie as if it’s the first time. “Jesus, I’m sorry, you don’t need to hear about a stranger’s family issues.”

“It’s okay,” Julie says. “I want to know more about him, about all of them. I’ve talked to Luke’s parents a bit.”

“Luke.” An affectionate smile spreads across the woman’s face. “I’d almost forgotten about him. Wanna know something?” Julie nods quickly. “I used to have the  _ biggest  _ crush on him.”

Julie barks a laugh, a disbelieving sound that sends them both into a fit of giggles, which turn into a squeal of shock as drops of rain begin to fall.

The woman grabs Julie by the hand, picks her up, and they rush for cover under the tree.

As they watch the pouring rain, remaining mostly dry under the canopy, Julie turns to the woman, saying, “I’m Julie Molina,” and offers out her hand.

She shakes it. “Cassidy Parks.”

“Parks? Huh, I didn’t actually know Alex’s last name until now.”

“It’s not his. It’s my wife’s.”

It’s then, with Cassidy’s outstretched hand, that Julie notices the thin bracelet around her wrist. Pink, purple, and blue. In the same fashion as Alex’s rainbow bracelet. 

Julies thinks it’s a shame that Alex didn’t get to be around for that, for the solidarity with his sister when his parents abandoned him.

Cassidy shoots her a look, knowing that she knows, but she only smiles -- full of playfulness that is so reminiscent of Alex. “I doubt it’s gonna let up anytime soon. Get ready.”

They run.

\--

Julie starts to wonder whether Reggie is real or some kind of figment of all their imaginations because there’s hardly a trace of him anywhere, even less than Alex. At least, he had an obituary. The archives she’s spent hours scanning through looking for Luke and Alex turns up nothing for Reggie. 

Sat hunched over her laptop, straining her eyes to read the same website she’s read a dozen times before, Julie lets out a deep breath, falling back onto her bed.

Offhandedly, Flynn comments, “You better put this much effort into finding my grave when I die,” not bothering to look up from her phone at the other end of the mattress. 

Julie closes her aching eyes. “Why would I need to find you?”

Flynn’s voice is entirely casual, like this is a perfectly normal conversation, as she says, “You know I want to die under mysterious circumstances. My murderer will bury me in some weird place and you’ll have to find it.”

Opening her close just enough to see Flynn watching her, Julie laughs at the completely serious expression on her face, sounding only a little delirious. 

“If you’re dying, I’m dying, too.” She nudges Flynn with her foot, earning a playful smack in return. “That’s just how we work.”

“Do  _ not  _ start singing right now. This isn’t High School Musical.”

Julie gasps, bolting upright. “I’m Gabriella, you’re Taylor.”

Flynn’s eyes light up, a massive grin spreading across her face. “Luke  _ is  _ a Troy Bolton look alike. That makes Alex Ryan. What about Reggie?”

Julie’s shoulders deflate, any spark of humour leaving her as she focuses back onto her laptop. It’s been almost two weeks since she visited Alex, four since she started looking for all of the boys. She  _ has  _ to find Reggie.

Flynn sighs, shuffling across the bed to rest against Julie’s shoulder. “Look,” she starts, “I know you love them, I get it but… why do you  _ need  _ to visit their graves?”

“Because who else will?”

No one says anything for a long while, only the sound of Julie typing, working herself into exhaustion searching for some remnants of her friends, fills the tense silence. 

Eventually, Flynn pulls up her phone, still looking at Julie’s screen as she types. “I might know someone who can help.”

“Really?” Julie asks, trying not to get her hopes up. “Who?”

“Just a friend.” Flynn shrugs, turning off her phone once finished. “She’s into computers and… some totally legal stuff.”

Julie snorts. “Just say you have a crush on a hacker.”

“I never said  _ either  _ of those things.”

“You didn’t have to.”

Flynn rolls her eyes, blatantly ignoring what Julie said. “She can find anything  _ but _ she probably won’t answer her phone until the morning, so we might as well go to sleep.”

Julie’s eyes dart to the time on her screen, reading  _ three fifty-two a.m  _ and suddenly feels the tiredness take her.

“Okay,” she says, closing her laptop and places it on her bedside table. She and Flynn slip under the covers. “Thank you -- for putting up with me.”

“Anytime.”

-

It’s last period on a Monday and Julie’s given a note, passed up through the rows from a girl in the very back she doesn’t recognise. Trying to open the paper discreetly, avoiding alerting her teacher, Julie coughs a few times to cover up the sound. 

Julie stares down at the address like it holds all the secrets of the universe. It feels real all of a sudden. 

All of her effort and confusion has finally paid off and she subtly pulls out her phone, texting her dad to let him know she’ll be staying at Flynn’s.

The bus is thirteen minutes late. She sits in the front, away from the weirdos in the back, and she can’t help the bouncing of her leg, anxiety creeping into her stomach the more time passes. Julie knows there’s something wrong, something  _ has  _ to be, if Reggie’s life was practically wiped clean from any public records. 

It must have to do with his parents. Only Luke ever mentions he actually has them, and Reggie always gets weirdly quiet when the topic is broached. That, though, does nothing to quell the sickening unease in her stomach.

The bus stop stops a block away, so she walks for the remaining few hundred meters, hoping the fresh air would help. It doesn’t, it can't even break through the voice in the back of her mind pointing out she already passed a cemetery not that far back. 

There wouldn’t be two so close together -- she knows that.

And yet, Julie’s still stunned when she stands before the crematorium. 

There’s no grave for Reggie, no place for Julie to lay her dahlia down, nowhere for  _ anyone  _ to visit. Just a pile of ashes somewhere. Julie knows it’s an unfair thought but with everything she knows about his parents, it seems...impersonal. Like they wanted him to take up the least space possible. 

Numb, Julie starts walking, needing to be anywhere but here. She finds herself in a nearby park, almost collapsing into the swing set. She doesn’t cry, doesn’t know what to do about the hollow feeling in her chest. 

So far in her own mind, Julie doesn’t notice the person approaching her, sitting in the other swing but faces the opposite way. 

“You know,” he says --  _ Reggie  _ says, “I would’ve told you, if you asked.”

Julie doesn’t bring her gaze from where it’s fallen into her lap. “I’m sorry. I just -- I wanted… I don’t know what I wanted.” 

The chains squeak as Reggie scuffles his feet on the ground, swinging himself gently. 

“How’d you know I was here?” she asks. She casts a quick glance around to make sure no one could see her talking to herself. 

She can hear the gentle smile in Reggie’s tone. “Flynn told us everything,” he says. “She, uh, figured out where she was sending you and came to the studio to stop you but -- we definitely  _ weren’t  _ playing without you” -- Julie scoffs at that but there’s no bite behind it -- “and we made her explain everything. It was kinda weird, having to keep playing so she could hear us, but we made it work.” 

“Are Luke and Alex mad at me?” 

“No, just -- just confused why you kept it such a secret.” 

Julie blows out a breath, leaning forward to hide her face in her hands. “Well, there’s no hiding it now.” 

Reggie laughs lightly, which makes Julie feel extra guilty for her next question. 

“When did you find out?” 

“That I was cremated?” he clarifies, Julie nods. “Uh, a while ago I found my mom. Yeah, she… she always talked about moving to San Francisco when I was a kid so, I dunno, I used some ghost powers and found her.” Reggie pauses, leaning so far back in the swing that Julie can see him from the corner of her eye. He has his eyes closed, face pointed to the sky. “In the back room was a little urn with my name on it--” he laughs again, though there’s no humour behind it anymore “--I don’t really want to know how they decided who got me after the divorce.” 

A tear slips from Julie’s eye. It’s rather telling, when she looks at how Reggie’s mom has his ashes and at his attachment to Julie’s dad. It makes sense, in a painful  _ I don’t want this knowledge  _ kind of way. 

“I’m so sorry, Reg.” Julie finally turns her head to properly face him, finding him leaning all the way back now, held up only by his loose grip on the chains.

He looks peaceful like this.

“Don’t be,” he says, opening his eyes to look at her. “They weren’t the greatest parents to begin with.” 

“Still.” 

Reggie hesitates. In one large motion, he pulls himself up and off the swing, coming around to Julie’s front. 

“I’m okay with it,” he says, voice tight and more somber than his usual tone. “Now, do you want to stay here and be sad, or do you wanna go home and rehearse with our killer band?” 

He offers out his hand. 

Julie takes it, already making a plan to weave the stem of a dahlia between the strings of Reggie’s bass and leave before he sees her. 

\--

Once or twice a month, Julie disappears with a bunch of flowers in her hand and the boys don’t question it. She always makes sure the headstones are taken care of -- though, Alex’s takes extra work to clean up. 

She runs into Emily and Mitch a few more times, always up for a conversation as they stand over Luke’s grave, and she swears she hears Emily humming the tune to the song she gave her. 

She sees Cassidy at Alex’s grave once, where she reveals she barely knew anything about her brother’s band, so Julie burns an extra copy of the Sunset Curve CD she has and mails it to her. 

There’s a secluded spot under the pier that Reggie tells her he liked to go when the house got too loud, and it’s never without a dahlia now. 

Julie mourns the boys that didn’t get to live but celebrates the ghosts that changed her life, that reminded her what it really means to live. 


End file.
